The Indian Space Research Organisation launched a Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in eastern India on Thursday.
According to Space.com, “The GSLV rocket was expected to place the EOS-03 satellite into a preliminary transfer orbit to provide real-time imaging, monitor natural disasters, and crop health”.
However, it is disappointing to know that the mission was not accomplished due to a performance anomaly. It was reported that the first and second stages started successfully but the third stage did not go as planned.
According to an official statement released by the ISRO, it said, “GSLV-F10 launch took place today at 0543 Hrs IST as scheduled. Performance of the first and second stages was normal. However, Cryogenic Upper Stage ignition did not happen due to technical anomaly. The mission couldn’t be accomplished as intended.”
The development was later confirmed by ISRO chairman K Sivan, who said “(The mission) could not be fully accomplished mainly because there is a technical anomaly observed in the cryogenic stage. This I wanted to tell all my friends.”
However, the launch failure is the first for India since 2017.
The GSLV launch failure breaks a streak of 14 successful launches for ISRO, the launch tracking site Spaceflight Now reported. It began after the 2017 failure of a different Indian rocket, a smaller Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle, carrying a satellite for the Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System. That 2017 failure was the first in 20 years for India’s PSLV, according to SpaceNews.
